Chris "Anagarika";12563454 said:
Martin,
Thanks for another video!
I need to clarify my understanding:
- counter intuitive means usually stropping with leather + compound requires less pressure but wirh WB it's better to use more pressure. Question is why?
- to have higher polish: take a finer copound and more layer below, all pre-compressed. Will it work also with diamond paste, as diamond will be much harder?
- what is your recommended steps for simple softer steel like SAK?
Chris, by using more pressure you get more microtooth on the edge, making it much better in my opinion for everyday cutting and longevity, and it enables the abrasive to do a lot more work in terms of light edge repair and maintenance. So simple - as long as the edge isn't in real bad shape, you have one step to bring it back to snuff, maybe two if you want to burnish with plain paper. I usually leave my last sheet of plain paper wrapped around the board, and next time one needs a touch up I just apply compound to the same sheet.
You could use a very fine abrasive and a light touch (intended to mention that if I didn't). In that case use like a regular loaded strop with the goal of smoother refinement - shaving edge, but then you don't get benefit of the improved feedback and are more liable to loose the angle, especially if you touch up the edge frequently. It also won't have enough bite to repair a moderately worn edge. The texture does part of the work (if you let it), the abrasive does the other part. Generally I find a good trade off by using higher pressure up front for repair/refreshing the edge, then I'll make a few light passes to take it up a small notch.
By using more layers and compressing them you do a few things - increase the surface area by quite a bit, which tames the texture effect of the teeth somewhat. This comes in real handy for polishing back bevels on convex and Scandi and for maintenance thinning of flat-sided cutlery, otherwise if you bear down you'll see (regular) irregularities in the grind path from the Washboard teeth.
You are also adding more material for the abrasive to sink into. Even pre-compressed, every layer is going to have a small amount of deflection that will add up - you can't have more sink of the abrasive without more danger of rounding the apex. Now you have to use less pressure and the abrasive cannot do quite as much stock removal, same as with a regular leather strop. It's all a balancing act between the edge you're shooting for, the margin of error you're willing to work with, and how easy you'd like your maintenance methods to be. At some point, you'll loose the Washboard feedback even if the paper is precompressed, you're back to using a lighter touch etc, and probably adding an additional step to your maintenance routine because this level of polishing isn't really efficient for any appreciable stock removal. I have to add, the paper is still very dense and rounding is still not a huge concern, especially if used with convex and Scandi as these edges tend to have a bit of curve to the back bevel that minimizes rounding anyway.
You could certainly use it that way and get good results. I made it as aggressive as possible to start and this also gives maximum increase in feedback, and makes the burnishing effect possible. The user can tame it as much as they want to suit their desired edge type, but there's always a trade-off.
I never tested it with diamond and probably never will. A sheet of paper that's intended to load up (due to the higher stock removal rate) and be discarded in short order isn't a good repository for a material as expensive as diamond slurry. For harder steels you could switch to SiC powders that would be cheap and effective (they don't work as well on more common steel, so I went with AlumOx for my compound). I've tried other more durable substrates and none of them worked as well as plain old paper, and all were more expensive. If you had to work with high wear steels and wanted to use the washboard and diamonds to do so, diamond lapping film would be a good investment. Its relatively pricey, but would last a long time and grind anything. Not the same as stropping though. Maybe some of the finer quality writing paper might be durable and thin enough to work well and hold up long enough to get your money's worth from diamond paste?
If you're working on softer steels about the only thing you might need to do different is lighten up on the pressure a bit (maybe, I've gotten great results messing around with an Old Hickory paring knife and did nothing different), or add a drop of mineral oil to the compound. Doing this will allow the abrasive a bit more mobility and seems to help with burr formation/removal on softer steels. Just a couple drops though, too much and the abrasive will get worked off the high points - you'll loose all your bite (notice I don't bring up adding oil very much anymore - easy to get into trouble and makes consistent results more difficult).
Holy Cow! how long have I been jawing on here!
Hope that answered the question....
